The Only Constant is Change

It's Haruhi, Kaoru, and Hikaru's final year at Ouran. Dynamics are changing and evolving... What will happen to the Host Club Members?

Author's Note: This story takes place about 8 months after the events in A Faire Shot at Mythology. It can be read as a stand alone, but it references events and items from that piece as well. If you are reading my work for the 1st time, I would humbly suggest reading my other stories The Game and A Faire Shot at Mythology before reading this to completely understand some of the relationship dynamics that I use. I promise that if you like this style of writing you will like those too. =)

79. Decorations and Disclosure

Renge and Mai walked back into the library only to discover that they were the first of the Host Club to arrive.

“And they say that girls are the ones to take forever to get ready,” Mai grumbled.

“This is the Host Club we are talking about,” Renge replied with a smile. “Haruhi and I were ALWAYS ready before the boys were.”

“I wish I could have met everyone back when you all were in school together. I bet you guys were a riot. Just some of the stories you have told me are insane and I know you haven’t even come close to telling me everything,” Mai responded as she headed over to the pile of boxes that had been delivered. “I still can’t believe that you obsessed over Kyouya. He is seriously intense and sooo not your usual style.”

“My usual style being female and flamboyant, not male and serious?” Renge teased.

“I prefer the term stylistic trendsetter on the edge of the mainstream.” Mai pouted.

Renge laughed. “Oh you are on the edge of something, all right.” She grabbed a Styrofoam pine cone and tossed it at her girlfriend.

“Hey!” Mai tried to dodge but the pine cone bounced off her shoulder. She picked it up and tossed it back.

“You are right though,” Renge answered as she easily caught the cone and continued rummaging through the boxes, pulling stuff out at random. “I had this fantasy of Kyouya that only lasted about a week before I realized that there was no way that I could actually have a relationship with him. Notwithstanding the fact that at the time I thought he was gay, because he was obviously attracted to one of the other Hosts.”

“Tamaki?”

“Haruhi,” Renge smirked. “Haruhi was still masquerading as a boy when I met her and Kyouya would be constantly watching her when he thought that no one else was looking. It was pretty clear that he was the sarcastic straight man to Tamaki’s outrageousness, but Haru is who he would watch. Of course, once I started paying attention it was pretty clear that most of Host Club were watching her. She on the other hand, seemed completely oblivious to it all until the end of the year.”

“So Tamaki was the flamboyant one, not Kaoru?”

“Definitely. The twins obviously had style and were the brains behind the costumes, but the ideas and the over the top antics were ALL Tamaki.”

“I’m kind of surprised that you didn’t have a crush on him. He’s definitely attractive for a male and he is much more your type.”

Renge pretended to think about it, “Tamaki? Nah, he was a bit too much like an overeager puppy. All bounce, cuteness, and about as much sense.”

“HEY!!” Tamaki cried as he entered the room with Kaoru snickering silently beside him. It was clear that they had been listening behind the door.

Renge turned dark red as the blush took over her whole body. “Errrrr… ummmm.”

“Overeager puppy sounds like a good description of the boss at the time,” Kaoru teased as Renge threw the pine cone at him this time, bouncing it squarely off his forehead. “Ow!”

“Some people just don’t appreciate imagination, and romance,” Tamaki huffed as he caught the pine cone on the bounce.

“Is that what you are calling it, Tama-chan?” Hani said with a lilt in his voice as he and Takashi entered the room.

“The girls never seemed to mind my romantic nature,” Tamaki grumbled.

“Because they were even more silly than you,” Kaoru laughed, “Right Renge? I seem to remember the first day you arrived at Ouran – hearts in your eyes and fluff in your head.” Kaoru ducked as both his lovers grabbed items and stalked toward him. He stepped back quickly and began back-pedaling furiously, “but both of you came to your sense eventually.”

Hani and Takashi watched as both Renge and Tamaki backed Kaoru into a couch. As Kaoru’s knees hit, he overbalanced and fell backwards on it sprawling across it. As they reached the couch, Tamaki and Renge looked at each other, dropped the decorations they had been holding, grabbed the closest throw pillows, and started whacking Kaoru with them.

Kaoru laughed as he wiggled and tried to avoid them, but soon gave up the fight. “Ok. I surrender. You both are the most intelligent and non-fluff filled people I know.”

“Better.” Tamaki grinned.

“And don’t you forget it,” Renge smirked while giving one final whack before tossing the pillow to Hani and linking her arms with Tamaki. “Now, what do you need us to do for the party tonight? I started sorting a few things out that I can use for the scavenger hunt, but I know there is a lot more that you need to do. How can we help?”

Tamaki put on his best Host King smile and pulled out a notebook. “I planned everything out with diagrams and notes. If you look closely, all the boxes are organized by room.”

“Great organization Tama-chan.”

“Thanks,” Tamaki answered Hani. “I originally was going to have all the staff do this while we went somewhere, but with us helping them, it will go even more quickly. The only thing I didn’t plan was the Christmas tree. I thought it would be fun if we decorated that ourselves.”

“Sounds good, boss.” Kaoru sat up and smoothed out his clothing. He felt a buzzing and pulled his phone out of his pocket. “Hika just sent a message that the press conference will be in a couple of hours, so it will be at least another 3 hours before he, Haru, and Kyouya join us.”

“Got it.” Tamaki nodded. “That should be the perfect amount of time to get this done, then we all can relax a bit before the party.”

“I will,” Kaoru replied and sent a quick response. His face tightened as he read more of the message. “It sounds like it is going to be a tough one for Haru and Kyouya. Hika just told me that there seems to be a rumor going around that everything that has happened is just a publicity stunt for HDG.”

“It is not surprising,” Tamaki sighed. “Yoshio’s attorneys have to be scrambling at this point to misdirect his actions and trying to discredit your mom is the most obvious route. The truth will come out though eventually.”

“I know it will,” Kaoru sighed. “I just hope that we can keep it contained. There still are a lot of things that we don’t want the public to know, and it is not just about Haruhi and Kyouya’s other relationships. Gods, if the public knew the truth about Hika and I, mom would be screwed. It’s just a danger- FUCK!” Kaoru looked up and saw Mai staring at him in interest. Panicked, he realized that Mai wasn’t aware of the intimate details of the group and he had completely forgotten that she was there. “Oh fuck, Mai. I… uh…”

Mai crossed the room, sat down next to him on the couch and took Kaoru’s hand. “Kaoru, please. Please don’t think that I would say anything to put your family or your friends at risk. I respect you, your brother, and especially your mother too much to spread gossip. I love Renge. I know that you are falling in love with her too. I know that she loves both of us. Your mother has been my mentor and idol since I was a little girl and she has been such a support for me in my career. I NEVER want to put that in jeopardy. Honestly, after spending the time with you guys this last week, it doesn’t surprise me that Haruhi has relationships with the others. It is pretty obvious when you let your guards down that you all really care about each other. That spin-the-bottle game was unlike anything I had ever played and I’m sorry, but the sexual tension among ALL of you was pretty obvious.”

“Obvious, huh,” Hani came and stood next to the couch.

“Very.” Mai smiled. “But I know a bit of what it is like to have to hide things from the world, so I may be a bit more observant of others who have to do so. But, just to even the scale of secrets…” Mai looked at Renge who nodded and came back over to hold her other hand. “I’m transgender.”

Kaoru looked at her in shock.

Mai smiled a little in response. “I know I don’t look it. I was born biologically a boy, but I was blessed to have a family that loved me for who I was and I was able to start getting hormone therapy as soon as I hit puberty. I was always slender and androgynous to start so the therapy was able to slowly enhance those features that make me a good model. I had the reconstructive surgery done for my 18th birthday and I have had a little bit of plastic surgery after that to help enhance the feminine shape. To all outward appearances - I am a woman. Actually, in all reality I am fully a woman. I just don’t have a uterus and I happen to have a y chromosome floating around in my DNA.” Mai laughed. “The only people who know are Renge, my immediate family, your mom Yuzuha, and now you guys. Even my pet pony doesn’t know. So… I promise you that I can keep a secret.” She squeezed Kaoru’s hand.

“Mai, wow,” Hani said as he gave her a genuine smile.

“Thank you for trusting us,” Kaoru said as he squeezed her hand back. “I appreciate that you shared your secret with us when I accidently blurted out ours. I promise you that I will also keep your secret, even from Hika if you want.”

“Thank you, but that isn’t necessary,” Mai responded. “I trust Hikaru and Haruhi. Even though I don’t know Kyouya very well, I know enough to not question his discretion.”

“I know they will respect that,” Takashi said quietly.

“They will and we will,” Tamaki said before stepping in front of her and bowing in front of her. As he stood up he handed her a long stemmed poinsettia. “Normally I would use a rose, but they are a bit out of season at the moment. I welcome you as an official Host in the Ouran High School Host Club. We may be technically defunct since more than half of our Hosts have graduated and dispersed across the globe, but we will always be a part of each other, and now you are a part of us.”

Mai accepted the flower as a tear slipped down her cheek. “Thank you. I don’t know what to say.”

Tamaki took her other hand and kissed it. “Say that you are happy to be a part of our crazy little world.”

“So Renge, I have a question…” Tamaki said about half an hour after he and Renge had separated from the group to hide the items they had selected for the scavenger hunt.

“Sure.”

“Are you really ok with my dating Kaoru?” Tamaki blurted. “I mean I know he really likes you, and it is pretty clear that you really like him, and I know there is this whole idea of poly that we are getting used to and everything, but I think you are pretty cool as a person and I don’t want to make our friendship really complicated and…”

Renge turned and looked at the now brightly blushing host. “I know my attraction for Kaoru kind of hit me out of the blue and I kind of get the impression that yours did as well at about the same time. When I talked to Mai about my sudden attraction to Kao, she told me to go for it. She has another partner and occasional lovers (though not since she and I started dating), but I had pretty much been monogamous on my side, mostly because no one else had seemed more interesting than working with Yuzuha. She was always open with me about her other partner and I have met her several times. She is pretty cool and really devoted to Mai, but their relationship is a bit different. I knew from talking to Haruhi that poly relationships could be a thing, so I learned how to communicate better and Mai and I have been really good ever since. Honestly, I kind of labeled myself as a lesbian once I started dating Mai, because I really only had a casual interest in guys and most didn’t seem worth the trouble. Somehow Kaoru managed to change that.”

“I understand that,” Tamaki said. “I have mostly been attracted to girls, but every once in a while I would find myself fantasizing about a guy.”

“Kyouya!”

Tamaki blushed hard again. “Well… yeah, mostly, but on rare occasions it would be one of the other guys. Then this vacation started and I found myself falling hard for not only Kyouya, but Kaoru too, and then the feelings that I thought I had pushed into platonic friendship about Haruhi came rushing back. It was confusing.”

“For all of us, I think,” Renge nodded. “I don’t mean your confusion, but that these last two weeks have opened up a lot of feelings for everyone. Maybe it was due to the separation of you and I from the rest of the group, or that Hani and Mori have been out of Ouran for more than 2 years now and are more focused on their futures, or heck it could be that we are all now technically adults, even though Haru and the twins have to finish up the rest of the year. I don’t think it’s a bad thing. We are just starting to become the people that we want to be.”

“And we are learning to trust other people outside of the little group like Mai and the Fujimias,” Tamaki added.

“And your friend Marika and her partners,” Renge smiled. “We have a lot of really good people around us if we just look. People that don’t judge us for who we are attracted to.”

“It’s nice. This party is going to be bigger tonight than I planned, but I can’t see having it without having all the people we call our friends here.”

“You can always have the bigger party tonight and then just do something small tomorrow morning for your original group. I know that Mai and I leave tomorrow afternoon, and everyone else leaves the day after tomorrow, so you should have some time, unless you planned something big for the final day.”

“I had an idea, but I am thinking about changing it. I want to talk to everyone though first.”

“Smart idea.”

“Thanks.” Tamaki smiled and handed her an ornament. “I really am glad that I got a chance to talk to you. I was a bit worried.”

“No need to be. Kaoru likes you differently than he likes me. Being with Mai taught me that we get different things from different people. One is not better than the other,” Renge giggled. “She definitely gets something different from being with her partner who is a pony than she does with me. I just don’t have that mentality.”

“Um… pony?” Tamaki asked. “I know that she mentioned a pony when she was talking about how her pet didn’t know that she was transgender, but I didn’t think it mattered to animals, so that kind of confused me.”

Renge tossed her head back and laughed. At Tamaki’s continued puzzled look she licked her lips and smiled as she said, “Mai has a kink. I told Kao that I was familiar with some types of BDSM and kink when he told me about your spanking him.” Renge grabbed his hand as Tamaki turned the deepest shade of red she had ever seen and he tried to slink away, “Sorry. I don’t mean to embarrass you. Kao told me only because of the whole soreness and wanting to date you thing. He also mentioned that he might be exploring more with Hani, since you weren’t quite as into it as he is.”

“I think I should hide now…” Tamaki muttered.

Renge pulled him in for a hug, “Oh Tama!! I really really didn’t mean to embarrass you. I was just trying to explain the pony thing for Mai.”

“What does Mai having pet pony have to do with Kaoru’s spanking fetish?” Tamaki asked, still clearly confused.

“Because Mai’s pet pony is her human girlfriend Samantha.”

“Oh. OH!”

Renge nodded as the light bulb started to flicker on over Tamaki’s head. “There’s a kind of kink called pet play where some people identify as animals really strongly. When they are in a scene, they become that animal and it is up to their owners to take care of them the way they would any other normal pet. Some people are puppies and kittens, some are foxes. Sam is a pony-girl. She has a latex outfit, bridle, and special shoes. Sometimes when they scene, she will pull Mai around in a little cart, just like a pony would. It’s kind of cool to watch, actually.”

“But not something that you want to do?”

“Exactly. It’s not something I really want to do, but both Mai and Sam love it, so I let them do their thing together, and they let me design cute outfits that they can wear while doing it.”

Tamaki grinned. “Sounds like it all works out. I don’t want to pry too much, but does that mean that they don’t… that they aren’t… ummmm… intimate?”

Renge laughed. “Without going into too much detail, Mai has a certain toy that she and Sam use for sex. It’s different than with Mai and me.”

Tamaki turned pink. “Aaah… got it, I think.”

“So to answer your original question, way back in the beginning of this conversation, I am perfectly ok with you dating Kaoru as long as you don’t mind that I am too.”

“I don’t mind.” Tamaki smiled and pulled her in for a hug before kissing her cheek. “In fact, I think you will be really good for him.”

It was Renge’s turn to turn pink at the praise. “Thank you. I hope we can become better friends – you and I. I think you are a pretty cool for a guy, Tamaki Suoh.”

Tamaki laughed and offered her his arm. “Thank you. Now that my mind is reeling from more new information, shall we finish hiding these trinkets for the game.”

“Let’s.” Renge grinned as she took it and they made their way into the next room.